A Life Divided
by charlotte.natalie
Summary: Alexandra Stabler's English extra credit.
1. Chapter 1

Alexandra took the last piece of luggage off her bed and dragged it out into the hallway. Her eyes widened as she studied the row of belongings she was taking home with her. "I don't know what's worse," she thought to herself. "The thought that I have all this stuff in the first place or the fact that I can only use half the space in the car…"

She shook her head at the craziness of it all and stepped back inside for a pen. On autopilot, she filled out the break sheet that had been taped to her door. "Alexandra Stabler, Room 414, Time out (she glanced down at her watch) 12:35 pm."

Alexandra gave her room a final once-over, grabbed her coat and purse, and locked the door behind her. She dragged all of her luggage to the elevator, shoved it all in, and went in after it. On her way down, she fished out her cell phone and hit speed dial #3. His voice-mail picked up, "Hey, this is Michael, you just missed-Hello?"

"Michael?"

"Hey Alexandra, what's going on?"

"Not too much. Where are you?"

"Sitting in the car in front of your dorm. Are you coming downstairs?"

"Yeah, I'm at the door right now. Do you think you could come and give me a hand with…". All of the sudden, she heard the sound of their phone call disconnecting. "Shit," she hissed. "What the hell is the point of having a cell phone if you can never finish a damned conversation with them??"

She heard laughter behind her and turned around to see her older stepbrother, Michael Benson smirking at her. "What's so funny?" She asked, raising her eyebrows.

"Two things," he responded, raising two fingers to drive his point home. "One, the fact that you ask yourself this almost every day and never have an answer, and two, the fact that you think your cell phone honestly cares or can even hear you. Alex, if you're gonna whine about your coverage all the time, find some cheese with ears. People may start to think," he dropped his voice to a whisper, "that you're crazy."

Alexandra and Michael's eyes deadlocked, as she pondered what he said and he smirked at the idea of being right. Finally, she sighed and grumbled, "You may be right."

"Well, of course I'm right. I'm older brother extraordinaire. I rock! I am da bomb. I'm…"

"You're helping me get my luggage into the car too, right?" retorted Alexandra, making sure he got a good look at her high heels. "Because, you should know that these babies can cause some crazy damage. Just ask that drunk asshole who was trying to get in my pants at that party in October."

Michael nodded; he had heard about that poor idiot. After that night, everyone knew better then to mess with Alexandra Marie Stabler. "Alright, come on. But, we've got to hurry or you're going to be late."

Alexandra nodded vigorously and began pushing her things out the door toward Michael, who, in turn, put them in the trunk and backseat of the black Volkswagen Jetta they shared. "I'm just so happy McDell came to his senses to offer last ditch extra credit. My grade is pretty nice in there, but there's always room for extra points."

"I know. I've heard a lot of people had some big issues with the class. I don't see why people didn't just drop. It's not a gen ed after all."

Alex shook her head as she carried out a shopping bag. "No, it's not a gen ed and most of the people in my class aren't even English majors. I don't get it either. Here, be careful with this," she said, handing him the bag.

"What's in here? Christmas gifts??" He asked, thumbing through the bag's contents.

"Yep, exactly what we agreed on, coffee mugs for Mom and Dad, a baby cheerleader outfit for Marissa, and a baby baseball cap for Adam. We've just got to wrap them once we get home. Oh, right, here's your change," she said, fishing a 5 dollar bill out of her pocket and handing it over to him.

"But...but, there's nothing for me," Michael said, giving an overdone drama queen performance. Alexandra rolled her eyes and kissed the air next to his cheeks. "Don't worry, darling. As soon as we get home, I'm taking you shopping for Christmas gifts. We'll make you as fashionable as my nearly non-existent bank account will allow."

"Needless to say, likewise."

Michael and Alexandra leaned against the car giggling for a few seconds. Then, Alex went back inside for her last bag.

"Is this it, Alex?" Michael said, throwing it into the trunk.

"Yep, that's it," Alexandra said, taking a quick look around. "Do you have my final paper?"

Michael nodded in the affirmative as he closed the trunk. "It's right on the passenger seat."

Alexandra gave him a grateful look as she noticed that it was neatly bound and printed on quality printing paper. "Thanks again, Michael. I really owe you," she said, giving him a hug.

"It was no problem at all, kiddo. I've always known that you only keep me around for the nights your printer breaks."

Alexandra gave him a dirty look as Michael felt the urge to laugh. The two of them stared each other down until Alexandra began giggling. Within seconds, any attempts to keep a straight face had disappeared. Once they calmed down, Michael gave her a gentle shove toward the car, "Come on, let's get out of here."

Michael and Alexandra got into their usual positions, with Michael driving and Alexandra in the front passenger seat. Michael turned the key in the ignition and pulled away from the dorm.

20 minutes later

"Stabler, Alexandra, you're up next," Professor McDell droned. Alexandra, startled, quickly stood up, and grabbed her work out of her bag. Michael gave Alexandra a reassuring smile as took a seat on a stool in the front of the nearly empty lecture hall.

"Whenever you're ready," said Professor McDell.

Alexandra took a deep breath. "Hi, I'm Alexandra Stabler, and for the first 16 years of my life, I didn't have a mother. Sure I had a woman who provided me with half my genes and gave me life, but, other than that, my father may have well been asexual." The class's laughter made Alexandra, a shy public speaker, feel better.

She paused and went on, "My father says life is made up of constant divisions. We have childhood, being teenagers, being college students, etc. He says that his life is divided pretty clearly. There's the time before me, the time with just me and him, and time with my stepmother, Olivia, and stepbrother, Michael, who are, for all intents and purposes, my mother and brother."

"The more I think about it, the more I realize my father hit the nail right on the head. When we look at our lives in retrospective, we see lessons in things that didn't seem extraordinary when they happened. We see clear divisions where there once were blurry lines. When we view our lives divided, they seem richer and much more wonderful then if it had all been one big ball of random events."

She took a breath and looked up at the class, surprised to see everyone, including the batty old Professor McDell, tuned in to her. Michael gave her a quiet round of applause from the back of the room, which was all the encouragement she needed. She turned the page, and read on.


	2. Chapter 2

A.N. Here you go guys. Sorry for the delay, I've been crazy busy. Instead of writing it like a paper, it's more like a series of one-shots (For Alexandra, short stories). Please read and review.

Chapter 2

"Good-bye to you  
Good-bye to everything that I knew  
You were the one that I loved  
The one thing that I tried to hold on to"- Michelle Branch, Good-Bye to You

18 years ago

Kathy Johnson only experienced one moment of doubt that day.

She knew she was ready to leave. She had hoped that this baby would change things. Having a new little life to take care of might have reminded her and Elliot why they fell in love in the first place; it didn't. She resembled her daddy so much that she thought he'd constantly be home to be with the baby and her; instead, a rape-murder-suicide took up his time, allowing him to only be at home in time for a 2am feeding. The other kids got phone calls every other day, as long as Elliot remembered. She was ready to give his long hours another try. "Maybe," she had reasoned with herself, "I don't step aside enough to see the big picture, maybe his hours aren't so bad." She accepted that line of reasoning and began to rebuild.

Two months later, though, her head agreed with her heart. It was time to go, for good.

That morning, she pulled boxes up from the basement and began haphazardly throwing her things in. She didn't care about neatness or organization. Nothing else mattered but getting out of her ex-husband's house as soon as possible. As she packed, she began thinking through the actions and consequences of the past year and verbally berated herself. "What the hell possessed you to sleep with my ex-husband? He meant nothing to you for so long, and then, you go jump his bones! What the hell kind of example is that!!!! And, keeping the baby!!!! Kathy Johnson, you know better than that!!!! You knew that wouldn't work!!!! Why the hell did you assume it would??? You wasted a year of your life trying to fix something that you knew was permanently broken!!!! Why the hell did you think things would be different????? What the fuck did you except?!?!?!?"

Kathy fell on to the bed and wept. She wept for herself and her own stupid mistakes. She wept for a child who didn't deserve to be born into this zoo. She wept for Elliot, who was a good man, just not a good husband. She wept for how empty she felt without a companion and how she felt even worse when she was with Elliot. She wept for their other four children, who wanted nothing to do with their father and didn't know the man he could be.

As she calmed down, she heard the baby stirring in the next room. Knowing she'd be hungry, Kathy took a bottle of formula out of the fridge and put it in the microwave to warm it up. As she stood in the doorway of the nursery where all of her children had slept, she felt another wave of emotion, but quickly bit it back. "No, Kathy," she whispered to herself. "You're done being emotional for today. You are going to feed and change this baby, put her back to bed, finish packing, and go. You have no more time for tears." Although she knew that she would probably cry again that day, her speech made her feel a little better. She bit her bottom lip and walked toward the crib.

As she stood over the crib, she couldn't help but smile a little. Kathy Johnson usually hated when other women spent all their time squealing over infants and how cute they were, especially if they were butt-ugly. Alexandra Marie Stabler, however, was an exception to her rule. With her father's dark hair and bright blue eyes, she looked the part of a beautiful child. Her calm demeanor and quietness had made the last two months of her mother's life a lot easier to bear. As Alexandra recognized her face and smiled, Kathy didn't bother to try to stop the tears from dropping onto Alexandra's forehead. "Come on, darling," Kathy sniffled as she lifted her daughter out of the crib. "We're going to get you changed, fed, and then Mamma's gonna say good-bye."

Once Alexandra was dry and full, her mother sat with her in the rocking chair. "Sweetheart," she murmured. "You lit up my life for the past year. I felt a joy with you that I haven't felt in years. Unfortunately, the joy you created was a result of my half-assed attempt to bring your daddy and I back together. I knew, somewhere in the back of my head that it wouldn't work from the beginning, and I hope you can accept my apology."

She leaned forward to kiss her daughter on the top of her head and continued, "Darling, tonight, when your daddy comes home, I'm going to leave. You're going to stay with Daddy. He's a really good person and he won't let you down. Your daddy and I let each other down, but I know he'll be good to you. I love you darling," she whispered as a fresh wave of tears hit.

Once she calmed down, she noticed that Alexandra was sound asleep. She slowly stood up and put her back in her crib. Afterward, she returned to feverishly packing.

7:00 that night

"Kathy!" Elliot called as he hurried out of his car and strode toward her. "Kathy, what's going on?"

Kathy pulled her head out of the back of her car and turned to Elliot. "I'm leaving," she responded calmly. "Could you please hand me that box behind you?"

Elliot was angry, but not very surprised. He picked up the box and handed it to her. "Kathy, I was pretty sure this was coming, but I thought we agreed to give the other notice before leaving."

If looks could kill, Elliot Stabler would have been dead twice courtesy of his ex-wife's glare. Any of the peaceful sadness she had felt this afternoon to her daughter vanished as she jumped out of the back of her SUV and addressed him. "What, Elliot, two months wasn't notice enough!!!! I thought things would be different between us, but no, you just can't ever change. Does spending time with me cause you to cheat on your first wife, work??? Or, is spending time with me cheating on Olivia?" she said, the venom dripping from her voice.

Elliot stopped himself from smacking her across the face just before his hand made contact with her cheek. "Look, Kathy, I never cheated on you. You were the one with all the random boyfriends, hell; you were the one who wanted our marriage to be over in the first place!!! Why you came back and made a baby with me, I'll never know, but I do know that I want you and all of your shit out of my house within the next goddamned half hour!!!!" He roared.

"Well, aren't you just a lucky bastard; I'm already ready to go," she retorted as she slammed the hatch of her car closed. She picked up the baby carrier from the ground and thrust it into Elliot's hands. "You can keep it," she hissed.

Elliot's poker face dropped for a second; Kathy had fought like hell for custody of their other four children and Elliot couldn't figure out why she wasn't fighting him now. Kathy caught the look and answered the unasked question. "I don't ever want to see her again!!!!!!" she lied. "If I'm trying to forget you, why in the world would I take a constant reminder of you with me?????" She swung herself into the car, turned the key, and pulled away from her ex-husband and daughter forever.

As she stared in the back window, she saw Elliot taking Alexandra out of the carrier and holding her on her shoulder. She felt a tiny tug of doubt as she wondered once more if things could work out between her and Elliot. Before she let herself get too carried away with that line of thought, she mentally slapped herself, "Kathy, you know it's over," her brain lectured. "Just keep driving."

With that thought in mind, she pushed down on the gas a little bit harder and sped away from her old life forever.


	3. Chapter 3

A.N. Chapter 3 in record time, kids. Please read and review .

Five-year-old Alexandra Stabler had never been a troublemaker in her kindergarten class. She was more then content to color all day, play with her friends, and listen to stories. All throughout the year, she had been her teacher's poster child for good behavior and had the intellectual smarts to boot. However, no matter how good a person is, we all have our breaking point. Alexandra's occurred during her class's Mother's Day tea.

Ever since the class had came back from Spring Break, Alexandra's class had been completely focused on their Mother's Day Tea. Everyday, they practiced a poem that they would recite on the day of the tea. They painted garden pots and planted seeds as presents. Their teacher, Mrs. Mayman, could sense the excitement buzzing through her classroom as she listened to her students gleefully share with each other how secretive they were being with their mothers about it.

The one child Mrs. Mayman was worried about was Alexandra Stabler. She knew Alexandra's mother was out of the picture; her father, Elliot Stabler, had confirmed it at parent-teacher conferences earlier that school year. Both Mrs. Mayman and Elliot had told Alexandra that if there was another person she would like to invite to the Mother's Day Tea, she was more then welcome to do it. When Mrs. Mayman brought this to Alexandra's attention, she gave Mrs. Mayman a shy smile and said, "Thank you, Mrs. Mayman. I'll think about it."

Mrs. Mayman had been excited to see whom Alexandra would ask to come with her. She had heard Alexandra talk about her uncles Fin and Munch, and her grandfather Cragen and was curious about meeting one of her aunts. However, on the final deadline for RSVPs to be returned to her, Mrs. Mayman had not gotten anything back from Alexandra. She considered suggesting to Elliot Stabler that Alexandra should be absent on the day of the tea, but she couldn't think of any good reasons besides the fact that she didn't have anyone coming to see her. Alexandra had been just as involved as her classmates in the planning of the tea and she could only imagine the heartbreak Alexandra would feel at not being invited. That decision made, Mrs. Mayman threw herself back into preparations.

Day of the Mother's Day Tea

Alexandra Stabler stood in a line with her classmates, ready to recite the poem. Alexandra still had the dark hair and blue eyes she inherited from her father. She smoothed the skirt of her yellow dress and twirled a pigtail around one of her fingers as her teacher, Mrs. Mayman, stood up and addressed the mothers. "Everyone," she said in her gentle voice. "Your children have been working to memorize a poem and it's time for them to recite it!" The mothers gave a polite applause, and the first speaker, Marissa Adams, began.

While she waited her turn, Alexandra began to think about her mother. She didn't remember her at all. Her father hadn't told her much about her either, just that her mommy felt it would be better for she and daddy to be a family. Even in her five-year-old mind, that stung. She stared out into the sea of mothers, who were paying attention to their children. Her eyes began to well up. "It's not fair," she thought bitterly to herself, "that everyone here has a mommy but me."

All of the sudden, Alexandra noticed a silence in the classroom. She realized that it was her turn to speak. She opened her mouth and took a breath, then closed it. She didn't have a mommy to say things to, why should she say anything to other people's mommies?

As tears began to stream down her cheeks, Mrs. Mayman came up to her with the master copy of the Mother's Day poem the class had been practicing. She knelt down to be eye level with Alexandra, and whispered, "Sweetheart, did you forget your lines?"

Alexandra shook her head no. Mrs. Mayman nodded and smiled at her, then whispered, "Alright sweetie, it's your turn then."

As she was walking back to her chair, Mrs. Mayman heard a quiet "no" coming from Alexandra. She turned around, "No? Why not sweetie?"

"Because," she screamed. "I don't have a mommy to say it to." She walked over to the table where her potted plant sat, picked it up, and threw it in the trash. Before Mrs. Mayman had a chance to ask, Alexandra answered the question, "I don't have a mommy to give this to. Why should I keep it?!?!?!??!?!?"

It was in that moment that Mrs. Mayman understood the deep extent of Alexandra Stabler's pain. She had her aide watch the class as she took Alexandra's hand and led her to the principal's office.

A half hour later

"Stabler."

"Mr. Stabler, this is Casey Mayman, your daughter's kindergarten teacher."

Elliot's stomach flipped. "What's wrong? What happened?" he asked frantically as a million possibilities for this phone call ran threw his head.

"Nothing too serious, Mr. Stabler. Just…we were having our Mother's Day Tea today and Alexandra decided that she didn't want to be a part of it if her mother wasn't there."

Elliot sighed and buried his head in his hands. "Where is she now? Is she alright?"

"She calmed down and is currently sound asleep in the nurse's office."

"Alright. I'll come and get her."

45 minutes later

"Sweetheart," Elliot whispered, pushing some hair back from his daughter's face. "Darling, come on. It's time to go."

Alexandra's eyes fluttered open. "Hi Daddy," she said quietly.

"Hey sweetheart. Want to tell me what happened in kindergarten today?" He asked, taking a seat on the cot and holding her close.

"Everyone else had a mommy come for the tea but me today," she mumbled into her father's shirt. "Everyone else could say things to their mommy and I had to pretend like I had one. I didn't think it would be much different when we were practicing and painting our pots, but today, I just couldn't do it."

Elliot nodded and pulled her closer. He was definitely happy that his daughter was able to express herself much clearer then most 5 year olds he worked with, but he was also upset that a lack of mother had hurt her this badly.

As he imagined all the things he wanted to do to Kathy for hurting them, Alexandra especially, his daughter pulling on his shirt interrupted him. "Hey daddy," she asked. "Can we please go now?"

Elliot looked at her and smiled. "Sure sweetheart. Why don't we go to your cubby and get your things? Then, maybe we can see if Uncle Munch and Uncle Fin would like to go to lunch with us."

The sparkle immediately popped back into her eyes and the events of the morning disappeared into the past as she dragged her daddy down the hallway.


End file.
